Monday, 27 February 2017

The common wisdom surrounding designing dungeon
encounters has changed much over the years, yet the question of what makes for a
good one, or what makes for a good room mixture has never been satisfyingly
settled.

A wizard did it

The original approach, developed at the dawn of
gaming (and seen in such tattered artifacts as the El Raja Key Archives or First
Fantasy Campaign), stressed the game aspect with a very brief key and very
sparsely “seeded” dungeon levels. You would spend a lot of your expedition time
looking for the carefully hidden lairs and those memorable “special” encounters,
and – from our perspective – some of these games might now be described as first-person
crossword puzzles.

This philosophy had a relaxed attitude about what
goes into the dungeon: anything that’s fun and challenging, and damn those
pesky questions about why and how. That’s how Citadel of Fire has an underground tavern on one of its upper level
dungeons, how Castle Amber has an
indoor forest, how Tower Chaos has
an earth elemental named “Stoney” guarding the china room just off the kitchen,
and how White Plume Mountain has...
well, those canoes are a good start. You can
rationalise it, but reason is an afterthought – what matters is the spirit of
fantastic whimsy. At best, these adventures are great precisely because they take liberties with realism, and do it well. Without a vivid imagination
and the skill to turn imagination into mini-games, the results just feel flat
and randomly thrown together (this problem haunts much of the early tournament
scene, including, in my heretical opinion, a significant portion of The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth). The best examples of this approach
were always the modules which had a sense of cohesion abound them – vague, hard
to explain, but there in the
background.

The consequences of lousy housekeeping

Then there is the fantastic realism school, first expressed in a comprehensive manner
by an ancient Dragon article whose exact references I cannot be arsed to look
up. [edit: Identified by Settembrini, and updated with the correct illustration.] You know the one. It shows a dungeon room in two states: the original way it looked, and the
dilapidated, looted and repurposed state the party will find it during their
expedition. Certainly, this approach provides a sense of realism, of “being
there”, and it is actually more intuitive than stocking your dungeons with
random shit. If your dungeon was a temple, you stocked it with religion-related
encounters, and if it was a crypt, you sure didn’t put an underground tavern in
it (and underground taverns just kinda vanished from the gaming scene). This approach often provided a complete blueprint for your dungeon: if you put in a sacristy, you
might as well put in a crypt and a refectory, and how about a bell tower and some stables? It is no accident that this
approach, lauded across the game design community, ended up the dominant one
for decades, mostly displacing its predecessor. (It was, in turn, succeeded by
the modern “return to the dungeon” model, a selective (mis?)reading of gaming
history, which suggested that the good old days were all about “killing things and taking their stuff”,
while silently dumping the heavy focus on exploration the actual old games had.)

There are many advantages to semi-realistic encounter
design, but it can also go wrong in ways its proponents never considered. From
my perspective, the most important of these is the taming of our sense of wonder, either by considering
the fantastic impossible and an interest therein juvenile – a notion which had
been particularly popular in Hungary, and as I hear, Germany – or by requiring
the rationalisation of the irrational. This has a corrosive effect on any kind
of fantasy game, but it is particularly damaging
to D&D. Once you accept that fantastic things are dumb and beneath a serious person's interest, you remove much of what makes D&D worth playing. A “cabinet
contents” dungeon of endless barracks with bits of string and mouldy old boots
stuck in a succession of footlockers, or the “this used to be a scriptorium, where scribes scribed their scripts”
school of pseudo-historical flimflam is often a recipe for a dissatisfying
dungeon where nothing interesting happens. It subordinates fantasy to reality,
when it should have done the exact opposite. In the end, one gets the idea that
these dungeons are not worth playing. “Told
you so” say the people who never liked D&D in the first place.

Skulls. Why did it have to be skulls?

Rediscovering the fantastic side of RPGs is an
important achievement of old-school gaming. And there is no reason why we can’t
learn from multiple design philosophies and take the best they have to offer. My
go-to compromise has been to go for thematic
appropriateness, an approach found particularly often in Bob Bledsaw’s writings.
Thematic appropriateness links its encounters to an overall theme (be it a crypt,
desert oasis or teeming fantasy metropolis), but operates on the basis of loose associations instead of solid,
step-by-step logic.

When you say “port”, it says “old panhandler sells musical sea shells with secret messages, 1:6 of
ear seeker”. When you say “jail”, it says “Bluto and Balfour, two ogres (Hp 17, 23) administer regular beatings
and serve inmates Seaweed Slop; prisoners are Refren, musical pirate, Harko
Fum, beggar of the 4th circle, Mythor Flax, last bearer of Princess
Yarsilda’s shameful secret”. There are obvious connections here to a basic
theme, but also large jumps of logic – somehow, we got from that port to an ear
seeker and from a jail to a princess and her secret, although it does not immediately and necessarily follow from the starting point. You have to believe in
your ability to jump to make it – you have to let go a little. This is how
dreams connect things in our mind and how the better kind of random tables can
prod our imagination: by coming up with odd juxtapositions and fantastic things
that nevertheless feel real as long as we don’t open our eyes too wide.

This was the conclusion I adopted a bit more than
ten years ago. And yet, despite having been well served by the approach in
multiple different campaigns, I am finding that it should have come with an
important warning: use your themes, but don’t let yourself get bound by them. Most
recently, I have experienced this the hard way while experiencing a creative
block coming up with encounters for Castle
Xyntillan. As straightforward as designing about three quarters of the castle
proved, the remaining quarter (and the dungeon level) has proved a tough nut to
crack. I found myself in that state where I am too analytical, too much of a
cynic to have good flow – I could probably continue through via sheer
willpower, but the result would inevitably disappoint myself. What went wrong?
A simple creative block would have been a convenient excuse, but after a little
self-examination, I came to the conclusion that I let a coherent vision of
Xyntillan overpower my idea of it as a loosey-goosey funhouse dungeon with
improbable things. The existing structures and ideas of Xyntillan were closing off
the range of ideas I entertained at the beginning. My thought process became
path-dependent, predictable. All in all, I needed a break – not just for refreshment,
but to forget and let myself wander again in directions I am not expected to
go. Xyntillan needed to be less thematic to retain its theme.

Which again proves: there is a point where theory
ends and fuzzier realms of the imagination begin; and in those worlds, we must often
walk alone.

Thursday, 23 February 2017

“Who are you and why have you come here
without unfurling your flag?” came the demand from the parapets of the
small fortress.

“They think we are reavers.”

“We are not Northmen!”, cried Jonlar
Zilv. “We are peaceful merchants who have
been attacked, and could barely take over this ship! We have no flag, but need
food and supplies.”

“If you came with a peaceful intent, then
come – but only ten of you.”

The
company – now with Einar Sigurdsson in tow – climbed the small path to the
fortified gatehouse. Green and blue pennants fluttered, and bowmen were
watching their movements from above. The gate opened, and a mailed warrior with
a small group came to inspect the newcomers.

“Come and be welcome, if you are who you
claim to be. The Lord Elendir and
the Lady Frederica will receive you
and hear you out. But first, you must relinquish your weapons.”

With
a little hesitation – Gadur Yir was not entirely convinced they would not just
be slaughtered – they agreed, and entered a small courtyard surrounded by
walls. A great gnarled oak tree stood in the middle, surrounded by stone
benches and statuary. A shield bearing two acorns and a star was visible above
the entrance to the inner keep. The receiving committee left them to rest, but
the bowmen on the walls remained – just in case.

“Never forget Silhanosh” Elandil
Hundertwasser read a carved motto below the shield. “There is a legendary lost city on this island by that name. Do you know
of it, Jonlar?”

“Not me,” responded the minstrel.

Elendir Manor

They
were ushered into the central hall of the keep, a small but well-maintained
reception area. On two thrones sat a moustached man clad in a green cloak, a
sheathed sword and a bow by his side, and next to him, a middle-aged woman of
bronze hair, clad in a gown decorated with embroidered griffons. Their features
were fine, probably even half-elven in their delicateness. They introduced
themselves as the rulers of this little place, and seemed sympathetic to Jonlar
Zilv’s stories about their capture and eventual escape from the hands of
northern slavers (omitting only a few pieces of information).

“It was a bitter and desperate fight, my lady
– we have lost all we owned, and the only thing we have in the bargain now is
their ship.”

“Yet you have lived through the tragedy, and
that should be a cause for happiness. Your life may not be as bleak as you now
think”, advised Lady Frederica. “Among
the darkest shadows, there is a flicker of light.”

“We have also seen something that may concern
you. We recently passed a barren island with a small mansion atop the rocks. We
went to investigate, but everyone inside was dead – killed by some unknown
attackers, probably flying monsters.”

Lord
Elendir looked concerned: “That is the
Dwelling, a possession of the Feranolts. And it is indeed too close for
comfort!”

“The Feranolts? We are not familiar with that
name.”

“A noble family who originated from this
area. They were among those who had settled on this coast, and fought against
the Wraith Queen Arxenia, but as the fortunes of the city of Baklin rose and
those of Gont fell, they moved on. Now all they have… or had here was a small
garrison.”

Jonlar
was interested. “You speak of multiple
families. So this area is ruled by them?”

“It is all quite sad”, mused Lady
Frederica. “A few still stand, including
our own, but all have dwindled, and some are mere ruins haunted by beasts. Istaforas, Kortnar, the Dwelling, Elendir, Perladon... Most have moved on from here.”

Einar
rose: “And what of a larger castle in the
eastern forests, some way beyond the coast? We have found a map where it is
presented rather prominently.”

Lady
Frederica was taken aback. “Castle
Sullogh. Avoid that place if you value your life. It is inhabited by a race of
beings called Sulloghs – witch-created, green and cruel, with knives in each
hand. Castle Sullogh has been taken only once, by one Lady Izanoxin, but she left on a holy quest with her retainers and
never returned. Now it is inhabited by the Sulloghs again – and worse.”

“What of Silhanosh?We noticed an inscription referring to it in your garden.”

It
was again the lord’s turn to talk: “A
fair city, but lost to everyone. It was the pearl of this island, but fell in
the war against the wraith queen, and we may nevermore return to it. Seek it
not.”

“A family tragedy, then?”

“We might say so. My father left it as a mere
child, and told me much about its wonders. But it is useless to speak of it –
now we live here in this manor house, and later, who knows what the future will
bring. Perhaps we will once set sail and travel far to the west, beyond the
seas...”

They
talked some more, but it was getting late and it was also time to rest. Lady
Frederica advised the steward would talk to them about trading for supplies the
next day. The lord and lady retreated to their rooms in the building’s eastern
wing, while the company was escorted to the smaller guest rooms to the west of
the hall.

“So this is not a base of the Feranolts after
all” suggested Harmand the Reckless. “The
triangles mark the dwellings of local noble families… and interestingly, the
Feranolts don’t seem so important.”

“At least not here,” interjected Jonlar.
“What is the white triangle south of
Castle Sullogh? We did not learn, but maybe we should check.”

“We should take a look at this area to the
east. The forests seem thinner on the map” suggested Gadur Yir.

“I want to gut Grave-Wight” growled Einar
Sigurdsson.

“Interrogate him” warned Jonlar.

“I will perform the blood eagle on him first,
then we can interrogate all we want!” snapped Einar.

Einar
stalked to the door to apprehend the interloper, but failed, and the man bolted
down the dark corridor.

“Get him!!!”

Gadur
Yir stumbled over his own legs, but Harmand cornered the man in the central
hall, and spoke the words of a hold
person spell. The old man, clad in a gown and wearing a pair of slippers,
did not fall under the spell, and started crying for help. There was a sound of
arms and bellowed orders from the eastern wing as he was finally subdued.

“And who the hell are you?” Einar glared
at him with fury.

“I am Fragor
the Steward. I knew you lot were up to no good. Ha! You can take my life
but it is too late! I serve my lord and lady with to my last breath.”

“I think this man needs a drink and we need
to talk things over.” Jonlar Zilv quickly strummed the chords of “You Are As Bad As I Am” to make him more
agreeable.

“What the devil is this racket?!” The
Lord Elendir and the Lady Frederica came rushing into the hall with a group of
armed soldiers. “Fragor? … The visitors?
Explain yourself!”

“It was just a stupid misunderstanding, my
lord” stammered Fragor, the fire in him gone. “Please forgive me for waking you up – it was all my fault.”

“Is that so?” Elendir was everything but
convinced, but Fragor was insistent there was no foul play. Eventually, he
relented. “If you say so, good Fragor –
let us all return to our rest. But you should come with us now... just to
explain a few things. Milords...” they turned and left, leaving behind two
morose-looking guards to watch the throne room. The company also retreated to
their room, silently weighing the consequences.

The
next day, they were awakened by a knock on the door, coming from a stern guard.

“Come. The time for your departure is at
hand.”

They
followed him into the reception hall, now deserted, but for packs of food and
supplies. When asking about payment, the guard shook his head. “It is yours, a gift from the lady. She will
not accept money for it.”

Carrying
the packs, they were escorted into the courtyard, which was now watched by
dozens of bowmen from the parapets, all prepared for trouble. At the gatehouse,
they were silently handed back their weapons, and the guard nodded. “The best of luck for your distant journey.
Farewell.”

The
gates closed behind them, and they returned to the ship without much of a word.

***

After
sailing a little way from the coast and spending some time watching from the
crow’s nest if they were being followed, or if a messenger had left the small
fortress on the way towards Gont, they eventually decided to sail east and
investigate the sign of the white triangle. It was less than a day’s sailing
with good winds, and by afternoon, they could anchor the longship in a small
wooded bay where they spotted ruined walls beyond the shrubs and trees. It was
a lazy afternoon, and a warm wind played among the branches, accompanied by
birdsong.

“This is an evil place” grumbled Harmand.

Following
standard procedure, they ran the ship ashore, and while some of the men started
gathering firewood for dinner, the company headed for the forest ruins,
followed by a company of ten men carrying their makeshift battering ram. They
emerged on a low hilltop and surveyed the ruins of a small keep: its southern
walls were already gone, a pile of stones, but to the north, two structures
were still standing with some walls and a ruined gatehouse between them. The
smaller building to the west seemed to have one story only, while the other had
two. The weed-strewn courtyard also had a walnut tree with some vines choking
its trunk, and a stone well with a large statue next to it.

Perladon Manor

“The coast seems clear, but let’s proceed
with caution” advised Einar. “Men, you shall stand in the back and be
prepared for trouble.”

Creeping
closer, they saw the statue depicted a brute more than a man and a half tall,
clad in rags and furs, and wearing a haversack on its shoulders. It seemed to
be looking at something in its upheld hand, but whatever that was, it was gone.

“That is an ogre. It did not turn into stone
due to the sunlight” said Harmand.

“If I see a reptile or a woman, I will immediately
avert my head!” declared Jonlar.

Meanwhile,
Gadur Yir examined the tree, discovering it was still laden with walnuts – and
the vines encirncling the trunk were carrying heavy black berries, which he
wisely avoided. Turning his attention to the well now, he saw that the side
bore a wolf’s head and an inscription reading “*PERLADON*” Looking inside, he
saw water deep down.

“Hold the other end of this rope while I
climb down. ...and if any of you turn into stone while I’m down, just tell me.”

Descending
into the well, the half-orc’s keen eyes saw something glinting below the water
surface.

“There is always stuff on the bottom of wells”
Harmand grinned.

Gadur
Yir was more careful than to act rashly. He turned his attention to the well’s
mossy walls, looking for hand- and footholds to grab onto. This brought
something else to his attention – a protruding brick that looked most
suspicious.

“The water first” he declared, and after
hammering a dagger between the stones to hang the lantern from, dived underwater.
He descended below the surface, and grabbed something round in the silt,
retrieving a heavy silver jug. “Now that
will fetch a nice price.” Turning his attention to the brick, he pushed,
and his attention was rewarded as he saw a short tunnel leading forwards toward
a corroded iron door...

...however,
at the same moment, there was a commotion up in the courtyard. The door to the
western building swung open, and a burly hand threw a large basket among the
company before slamming the door again to the chorus of booming laughter from
inside the building. Hissing and clucking in an obscene manner, three monstrous
abominations with the features of both chicken and lizards tumbled out, biting
and pecking at everyone they could reach.

“I bet on the half-orc!” came a booming
voice from inside.

The
characters fought desperately to keep the bewildered monsters at bay. One
jumped on Jonlar Zilv and pecked him with his beak, and Jonlar turned into an
inanimate stone statue.

“I think it’ll get the elf before they’re
done!” came another cry, followed by more laughter.

“Oh, jump
out, you cocksucker!” howled Elandir Hundertwasser, demonstrating a
previously unknown part of his vocabulary, and simultaneously casting a command spell. The door creaked open and
a huge, obviously angry ogre landed in the courtyard’s dust, followed by
multiple others...

...meanwhile,
paying no heed to the events unfolding above him, Gadur Yir contemplated the
iron door. He tried to shove it open, but miscalculated as he rushed it, and bent
one of his pauldrons. Cursing, he turned back towards the well...

...wile
outside, a bloody battle developed between the ogres, the party, the remaining
cockatrices and the ten sailors who threw javelins at whomever they could get a
shot at. There were seven ogres, but although battered and bloody, the numbers
and ability of the company and a few hold
persons prevailed – except for Jonlar Zilv, now a statue. Gadur Yir climbed
the rope and climbed out with the silver jug just as the retainers were
chopping the last ogre to death with their axes.

“If Jonlar was alive, he would compose a song
about your cowardice” spat Einar.

“But he doesn’t” concluded the half-orc.

After
some discussion, while the others were patching themselves up and discussing
what was to be done, Einar, ever impatient, entered the building. He ventured
into a large kitchen, where a roast goblin was cooking on a spit above an open
fireplace. Faint squeaking noises came from beyond a barred door to the
southwest. Spying inside, he saw a huddled mass of goblins looking back at him
and begging to be freed.

“You can go now” the Northman told them. “Just remember that it was Einar Sigurdsson
who had saved you... him and his company.”

Interrogating
the grateful creatures, he heard them tell a story of a giant stone throne in
the northern woods, and a castle full of murderous green creatures.

“­Castle Sullogh” Einar thought to
himself.

Searching
the ogres’ lair in a northern room, he found their treasure bags: it was mostly
hunks of meat, stones and rubbish, but they were mixed with 900 gold pieces, a
bale of soft fur that turned out to be cat, and a fine silver plate hammered
with the letters reading “MINARVI”. Einar quietly pocketed the gold, deciding
to share it with only those who had fought in the battle, and skipping the
cowardly Gadur Yir.

After
the goblins were released, they sent further time searching the premises. In
the round tower that had served as a prison, they found a capstone carved with
the sign of a rooster. Harmand the Reckless recommended to search it, and after
hoisting him up, he found it to be a simple stone decoration. However, when the
same procedure was repeated in the ogre lair with the sign of a ship, the stone
turned and a slab of stone slid open in the corner!

The
passage was dark and exhaled damp rot. It had obviously lain abandoned for a
long time, and wss littered with sacks of mouldering grain. However, under the
sacks was the real prize – a hatch with a lock on it.

“This must connect with what is behind that
door in the well” Gadur Yir suggested.

Striking
the lock from its hinges, the hatch revealed a downward shaft with rungs
climbing down into the darkness. After a brief discussion, and instructing the
retainers to guard the outside and sound a horn if there was any trouble, the
company excitedly descended into a foetid passage...

***

Stairs
descended even deeper from the landing, worn with time and use. A locked iron
door, similar to the one the half-orc couldn’t open, blocked further passage. The
only lockpicks in the party had belonged to Jonlar’s statue, and Barzig the
Back could not open the lock with improvised tools, but with Einar’s strength, the
door proved a pinch to open. They saw a passage going forward, and one turning
to the right, then turning slightly to the left in the S-SE direction. Choosing
the latter way, they continued. Vaulted rooms opened to the sides, laden with
old barrels and their bounty, sour and fouled. The second room to the east
revealed something else: a rectangular stone slab decotated with the carvings
of vines, grapes and grape leaves.

“Let me check this one” Gadur Yir
grinned, and rummaged behind the stone structure, looking for irregularities.
His efforts were rewarded as a stone leaf clicked, and a secret door opened in
the wall of the exterior room. “What do
we have here...”

They
entered a gallery running along the walls of a domed, hexagonal room,
overlooking a lower level filled with gloom, and separated from it by thick
iron bars reaching up to the ceiling. The floor looked richly appointed, with
fine ceramic tiles of ochre and teal colours. Deep underneath them were what
looked like stone chests or sarcophagi.

Under Perladon Manor

Around
the gallery they went, touched by the coldness of the deep, and through a door
to the south. Here was another chamber reaching east and west. The part they
were in was domed, the walls lined with wooden coffins, doors opening to the
north and south. To the east, iron bars and a barred gate blocked off an
interior chamber, where there was a single stone sarcophagus. Letters carved
into the floor spelled a message: “THE FOLLOWERS OF PERLADON: THOSE WHO HAD
VANQUISHED THE FORCES OF THE VALLEY, SHALL NOT REST IN ITS EARTH.”

“Another crypt. The Perladon family, eh?”
mused Harmand.

“As a cleric, I can detect evil if you wish
me to. But I don’t think there is a need for that” said Gadur Yir.

Barzig
tried his makeshift tools on the barred door, but to no avail.

“Well then, let’s get to work” the
half-orc spat in his hands and lifted the lid off of one of the wooden
sarcophagi. A skeletal figure was resting inside the coffin, wearing chain
mail, with a large shield and a flail on his breast. “Just make sure it isn’t...”

But
it most definitely was. The dreadful undead rose from its grave, and the other
sarcophagi shifted as well, and nine skeletons emerged.

“Begone!” bellowed Elandil Hundertwasser,
and seven of the skeletons turned to run.

“We can take them!” hollered someone, and
the first skeleton soon bit the dust as Harmand crushed it with a solid blow.

At
this point, something dark and ominous and inky billowed out of the stone
sarcophagus in the interior room. A dark form with glowing eyes of molten gold
and claws of shadow coalesced.

“I am Godfred
Perladon... and I am your death!” it hissed in a cold tone of lifeless
contempt. Its shadowy fingers started to trace the patterns of elongated, flat
figures of eight in the thin air, and it muttered syllables of magical power.

“Ooooh CRAP!” Harmand gasped as a fiery
spark flew out of the shadow’s hands, hurtled through the gap between the iron
bars, and detonated in a deafening inferno covering everything, crushing the bones
and wooden sarcophagi with its force and flames for seven dice worth 33 points
of damage.

...Gadur
Yir cursed in pain as he opened his eyes. He beheld a scene of devastation. The
charred bones of the remaining skeletons, and the incinerated corpses of his
companions lay on the blackened floor. The doors next to him had been torn off
their hinges. His ears were ringing, but he saw a figure bolt through the remains
of the northern door.

The shadow!
It was still towering behind the bars, looking at him with malevolent eyes.
Gulping, the half-orc reached for his holy symbol and held it high to call on
his patron god.

“I cry out to you in my moment of need! Help
me, oh...” There was an awkward pause as the shadow surveyed him with its
burning gold eyes. He had forgotten the name of his own god! He had forgotten
the goddamn name! The possibility of divine favour, whatever it was, departed.
Gadur Yir silently turned his tail and fled back through the way he came.

...panting
and running through the upper floor of the gallery, and into the cellar, he
felt the darkness below pull at him, and heard the hollow laughter of the
shadow. Or were his ears ringing? He stumbled, half-dead, into the corridor,
where the remaining skeletons cowered and fled as he beheld them. The exit! He
sped north and turned…

Glinting
metal flashed in the darkness, and he heard Barzig the Back’s sarcastic voice: “No hard feelings... but it had to be done.”
He parried desperately, and the bow-legged nomad cursed as his dagger broke on
the half-orc’s armour. Gadur Yir growled, spat, and with a mighty blow, brained
the hapless assassin.

***

Looking
back on the ruined manor house of the Perladon faily, Gadur Yir bid farewell to
Brusuf the Servant and the ship’s crew. They were free to seek their own
fortune on the high seas, but he was done with sailing for a while, and after
gathering some supplies and binding his worst wounds, decided to head for the
deeper woodlands in pursuit of new adventures. Turning his back on Jonlar Zilv’s
silent statue, he struck off through the thickets on the edge of the Forest of
Woe, and presently was gone.

(Session
date 5 February 2017).

***

Notable quotes:

Jonlar
Zilv, stoned: “I call it ‘temporary
invulnerability’.”

Harmand
the Reckless: “I call you our ship’s new
figurehead.”

Einar
Sigurdsson: “Let’s stop wandering the
realm of the imagination and let’s loot the manor house.”

Einar
Sigurdsson: “...but you feel the essence of The Word of Chaos! [A classic
Hungarian fantasy novel, and a formative experience for older RPG fans, of
which I’ll write more later] …we were
torn apart by a fireball, and only the half-orc survived, just like in the
novel. So cool!”

Elandil
Hundertwasser (quite dead): “But now who
will heal the world’s wounds?”

Someone
else: “Sure won’t be you.”

Elandil
Hundertwasser: “The key is inside you!”

Player:
“Did you design this adventure on your
own?”

Marvin,
Elandil’s player (sarcastically): “Do you
think anyone else could come up with something like a shadow shooting
fireballs?”

GM: “The ecological footprint of Gygaxian
naturalism strikes again!”

***

Referee’s notes: There is often a turning
point in the novels where you can determine who were the protagonists all
along, and who were the supporting cast. If our campaign was a novel, it would
now be clear that it was about the exploits of Gadur Yir, “the two-legged
plague”, “the cursed half-orc”, or call him what you will. They tried their
luck like the other times, they pushed it a bit too far (exploring a dangerous
dungeon with depleted, although not fully depleted resources), and this time,
it blew up in their face – literally, for a whopping 33 points of damage (I
rolled fives and sixes on most dice of that 7d6).

With
all but one member of the party dead – and it was an iconic form of death, make
no mistake – many of the current plotlines got severed just as the campaign was
almost turning in a predictable direction again. Certainly, Gadur Yir has
decided that Grave-Wight and the Feranolts, whatever their crimes, could wait
for now. So, we take a new direction again and some new planning is in order –
with new adventures and new companions. These paths will lead towards the
interior of the island, and in a sense closer to its deeper mysteries. We still
have to see where things will end up, although the elements and events of this
now concluded first arc will rear their head again and again, even if from new angles and perspectives.

With the
campaign’s unpredictable but characteristically Caldwellian turn (a term whose meaning I’ll discuss in a
forthcoming post), at least we now know whom to root for. Our protagonist has
been chosen!